AdèsThe Exterminating Angel

Erato 0190295525507

DVD

Thomas Adès’s The Exterminating Angel was first
seen at the Salzburg Festival,
then Covent Garden, before the
production travelled to the Met
in 2017 with some cast changes
in the leading roles. It is based
on Buñuel’s 1962 surrealist
film. Adès and his librettist,
Tom Cairns, collaborated to
reduce the cast to manageable
proportions, a mere 15 principal
roles, playing a group of effete
and over-privileged people who
gather for a post-opera party
and find themselves trapped
in a room, unable to leave, for
what is an unexplained and
presumably psychological
reason. The staff, inexplicably
spooked, are already fleeing as
the opera starts.

Adès’ music is challenging,
arresting and texturally
complex, and strongly conveys
the mental meltdown that
the characters experience as
their sophisticated veneer is
stripped and they descend into
suicide, sacrifice and incest.
He uses unusual instruments
in his search for startling
effect, such as the spooky
ondes martenot and scratchy
miniature 1/32 violins. The
vocal lines range from the very
top – Audrey Luna singing
the highest note ever heard
on the Met stage, an A above
top C – to John Tomlinson’s
lowest growl. The beauty of
watching it on film is that the
camera can home in on Tom
Cairn’s elegant production for
the viewer, catching individual
moments and increasing the
sense of claustrophobia in
what is an enormous space.
So we live, and in some cases
die, with the cast. Everyone is
on top form, the performers
incredibly involved, and the
tension builds unbearably. It
is an uncompromising and
challenging opera to watch,
but powerful and thrilling.
What happens? I couldn’t
possibly spoil it for you. You’ll
have to watch to find out.